This Anzac Day there are a host of events planned to commemorate and educate yourselves and the little ones about our wartime past, writes Diana Clement.

A field of thousands of Anzac poppies has been planted on Auckland's waterfront to boost awareness of Poppy Day.

Kiwi filmmaker Gaylene Preston has completed a specially commissioned short film to honour the 24 Battalion for Anzac Day.

Anzac Day theft angers war veterans, who see it as an insult to servicemen and their families.

New Zealand troops reflected on the deaths of two comrades killed in Afghanistan in the past year as they celebrated Anzac Day today.

John Key's decision to join the citizens of French town Le Quesnoy in their annual commemorations has started a new chapter in what Mr Key has called "a precious link with the town".

Tens of thousands of New Zealanders turned out at dawn services across the country.

Photos of Anzac Day services held around the world.

Photos from Anzac Day services around New Zealand.

On May 27, 1942, two Czech parachutists ambushed and wounded SS Obergruppenfuhrer Reinhard Heydrich near Prague. Heydrich was not seriously wounded but a ricochet bullet had carried cloth, wire and wool into the wound.

Not a picture book, not a graphic novel, not anything easily pigeon-holed, Chris Slane and Matt Elliott's study-cum-evocation of life in World War I is a great resource and a great read.

Anyone looking at New Zealand's military participation in the 20th century would see us as a bellicose little nation. For decades, we eagerly went where Britain (and later the US) went.

With flames spreading rapidly though his bomber aircraft, 22-year-old Sergeant Jimmy Ward tied a rope around his waist and crawled out on to the wing to douse the flames.

It makes Alfrieda Thompson smile wryly that her war-hero father named her after a girlfriend he had during World War I.